


Sometimes Forever

by eponymous_rose



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: 1000-3000 words, Canon - TV, F/M, POV Third Person, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-15
Updated: 2009-11-15
Packaged: 2017-10-02 23:48:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eponymous_rose/pseuds/eponymous_rose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes a second chance arises, another opportunity to cross the bounds of normalcy, straight into forever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sometimes Forever

Someday, Barbara expected she'd get used to it again; walking down a busy, chilly street, watching her breath fog in the air, and thinking back to the terrible cold of the winter of '63, instead of the ice and snow at the roof of the world, or the bitter chill of distant planets-

Ian's gloved hand found hers, and she leaned closer into him. He chuckled and let go her hand, wrapped his arm around her shoulders instead. "You're thinking of it again," he said, chiding.

"Well, I am now," she said, and poked him in the ribs. He jumped, shot her a wounded look, and she smirked. "That's your fault, isn't it?"

"I'm certainly not thinking about it," he proclaimed. "Not one bit."

"Which is why you accused me, I suppose," she said, grinning.

"Oh-ho," he said, "so that's how it is! Here am I, pining away for the Doctor, and trying to get you to admit the same." He was getting excited; his voice was loud enough that a few passersby were starting to stare. Barbara fought down a blush and smiled reassuringly at an elderly couple passing by.

"It's all pretty much the same, though," Ian added. "Here we are, two years into the future, and it's absolutely identical."

"Bus fare's gone up," Barbara reminded him.

"Apart from that," Ian said with a discreet cough. "It's like we've never left!"

Barbara rolled her eyes. "The world didn't stop spinning just because we were in the TARDIS these last two years instead of at Coal Hill-"

"I know that," Ian said, and winked. The story going around the teachers' common room was that they'd eloped, disappeared for two years on some romantic getaway. Neither of them had felt entirely inclined to dispel that notion. "Of course it didn't. But here we are - streets of London, no Daleks in sight. I can't be entirely sure, but I'll bet Vicki's Ancient New York is right where it's supposed to be."

They were silent a moment, thinking of Vicki and the Doctor, and the way the universe had of sometimes opening up, of swallowing the TARDIS whole-

"I hope they're all right," Barbara said.

"Vicki will keep him in line," Ian said, his voice a bit too cheerful. "They're probably having a grand old time, wherever they are. Whenever they are."

A gust of wind came up, chilly and distant, and Barbara felt tears in her eyes. "Do you think so?" she said.

"Hey," Ian said, and stopped, turning her to face him. A man behind them grumbled and jostled his way past, and Ian shot him a glare that would have cowed a Dalek. Barbara couldn't help laughing when the man, distinctly chastened, bowed his head against the wind and hurried on. "That's right," Ian muttered. "Just keep walking."

"The nerve of some people," Barbara said, smiling.

"I'll say." Ian's tone was light, but she realised that he was still staring after the man.

"What is it?"

"I don't know," Ian said. "I guess I'm still a bit on edge. Looking for Daleks round every corner. Daleks, or Roman armies, or Mechanoids, or-"

"Or the TARDIS," Barbara said.

"No," Ian said. "Not anymore, I don't think." His face clouded over, and he took her hands in his again. "You're not regretting it, are you?"

"Of course not," Barbara said, and was startled to find that she really meant it. "I just-" She pulled her hands from his and stuffed them back in her pockets. "I don't know, Ian. I wish they'd come with us, stayed here."

"Where it's safe," Ian said, and his face was disquietingly free of expression. She'd seen so many different sides of him over the past two years, beyond the polite schoolmaster, beyond the teasing friend, but it was when he was like this that she felt he'd changed most. They both had, and she wondered for a moment whether she'd be able to go back and teach her pupils about the Aztec people or Marco Polo's explorations with the same dispassionate interest - assuming they ever managed to argue and barter their way back into their old jobs.

"I was the one who suggested we use the Dalek ship to get back here," Ian said, and his voice was subdued. "I should've at least given you time to think it over."

"We had two years to think it over," Barbara snapped. "I wouldn't have blindly gone along with you if I weren't sure about it."

"I know," Ian said, running a hand through his hair. "Of course you wouldn't. But I can't help thinking we should have at least parted on better terms with the Doctor. We dropped it on him out of nowhere."

"He knew we wouldn't travel with him forever," Barbara said. "We'd have to leave sometime."

"First Susan, and then us," Ian said.

Barbara smiled, rested her hands on his shoulders. "That's how life goes, isn't it? Sometimes we lose people, and sometimes we find them. At least he can come by and visit from time to time."

Ian laughed. "That's right, you know. I can see it now - me, old and grey, hobbling along with a cane, you at my side, and the Doctor pops in asking to borrow a cup of sugar."

"Knowing him," Barbara said, "he'd show up the one day we hadn't any to spare."

Ian's face had relaxed into a smile again, Ian-like, at once gently teasing and warm. Barbara had a sudden urge to - to what? - but at that precise moment a woman dashed up behind them, made an awkward attempt at a sidestep, and ploughed straight into them.

Barbara stumbled and only just managed to keep her balance by clinging to the woman who'd bowled them over. Ian, exhibiting his typical grace, had tripped over a loose paving block and wound up flat on his back.

"Ian!" Barbara grabbed his reaching arm, helped him back to his feet.

"Thanks," he wheezed, rubbing at his head.

"Are you hurt?" Barbara resisted the urge to fuss over him as he pushed away from her with a wince, but sometimes she saw him still as he had been in the Aridian caves, face covered in blood, dazed but alive. And sometimes, when she let her fear get the better of her, she heard echoes of the not-Doctor turning to her, dispassionately. _Chesterton's dead._

"Just my dignity," he said, still gasping. "Got the wind knocked out of me, that's all." He grinned, then reached out and mussed her hair. "Don't fuss, Barbara."

"Sorry," said the woman who'd knocked them over, forgotten until now. She was wringing her hands, looking over Ian's shoulder to the street beyond. "Sorry, sorry. In a bit of a rush."

"You're telling me," Ian said, wincing. Barbara rolled her eyes; she knew him well enough to know when he was just playing for sympathy, and she had the worrying idea that this time it had rather a lot to do with the plunging neckline of the woman's rather modern top.

"Listen," the woman said, and all attempts at meek politeness vanished. "You haven't seen a tallish bloke pass by here? Suit, silly-looking trainers? Ridiculous hair?"

"Well," Barbara said, with a nervous glance at Ian; the woman's voice was rising in volume, and she looked quite ready to tear somebody limb from limb. "We haven't been standing here all that long."

"I knew it! I just knew he'd find a place to drop me off, and then just go swanning off without a care in the world-" She turned to Ian, suddenly intent. "What year is it?"

"1965," Ian answered automatically.

Barbara felt her breath hitch in her throat, saw Ian go pale as he really heard the question for what it was.

The woman blinked, looked startled at such a matter-of-fact reply. "Oh," she said. "Ta."

"Hang on," Ian said. "Now, just hang on a minute. Just a minute." The woman turned to look at him, and he waved his hands eloquently. "Just-just a minute," he stammered.

Barbara took the lead. "Who are you?" she said.

"Me?" The woman suddenly looked cautious, a bit afraid. "Er," she said. "Nobody much worth paying attention to. Donna."

"Donna," said Ian, having recovered from the initial shock. "How is it you don't know what year it is?"

She smiled hopefully. "Long day at the pub? Look, I've got to catch up with my friend. His scrawny neck's probably not going to wring itself."

"Ah," said Barbara, and decided to take a gamble. "A pub in the future, by any chance?"

Donna blinked. "Hah," she said. "That's-that's a good one, isn't it?" She elbowed Ian. "Isn't it just?"

"Hilarious," Ian said, with a significant glance in Barbara's direction. "That Barbara. She does know how to tell a good joke."

Barbara cast an exasperated look at Ian: why wouldn't he-

His eyes met hers, and she saw the worry in them, the fear. The meaning was clear: if they pursued this line of thought, it would mean abandoning the pretense of a life they'd managed to build for themselves these past weeks, would mean taking everything back, leaving again. Disappearing again. Becoming nobody again.

Wanderers in the fourth dimension.

"All right, all right," Barbara said, and her voice quavered. "It was a silly joke. Can't say I expected such a receptive audience."

"You're a laugh and a half, you are," said Donna distractedly - her eyes were on the crowded street ahead. "Aha! Now, if you'll excuse me-"

She dashed past. Ian took Barbara's hand again, and they turned back the way they'd come, away from Donna, from the maybes and might-have-beens. Barbara felt a chill in the air that had nothing to do with the weather.

Ian leaned in close, and his whispers ruffled her hair. "It's the right thing," he said, and his voice shifted slightly so it sounded more a question than a statement.

"Yes," she said. "Sometimes we lose people, and sometimes we find them."

"Doctor!" called Donna, at an impressive volume, somewhere behind them. "Doctor!"

Ian and Barbara grinned at each other. "Sometimes," he said, "we don't know what we're missing."

And Barbara kissed him, right there on the street in front of the record store and a group of scandalized-looking teenagers. Ian laughed against her lips.

"We may not know what we're missing," she said, "But sometimes it's better that way."

Hand-in-hand, they made their leisurely way down the street and into their future.


End file.
